You have the story wrong here. The Scarlet Beast of Revelation 17 was never said to be "wounded". That "wound" was to only one of the heads of the Revelation 13 Sea Beast - and not even the whole Sea Beast. Heads are referred to as literal mountains in Revelation, are they not? That means a near-fatal "wound" was given to a literal geographical mountain that the Roman Sea Beast was situated upon. I take this to be the disastrous fire at Rome in AD 64 which devastated the Palatine Hill region. Nero immediately launched a very expensive renovation program to create His "Golden House" and fabulous gardens with his bronze "Colossus of Nero" image on the imperial grounds that was about 100' tall. A marvel to all who presumed that mountain was destroyed.
Rome is not identified as the Scarlet Beast found in the wilderness. This wilderness setting is a Judean landscape feature, as well as being identified with Israel's wilderness wanderings after leaving Egypt. The harlot sitting on the Scarlet Beast's back was the faithless city of Old Jerusalem who had prostituted itself to the Roman Sea Beast for financial gain, and was guilty of the blood of the prophets and saints and of all slain on the earth from Abel forward, as Christ said.
I'm not denying or evading the Papacy's history of persecution of the saints in more recent history. Neither am I "oblivious" to those tumultuous times for believers. But the Papacy was not that which Christ pronounced guilty of the blood of the prophets and servants that He had sent unto them. That was Old Jerusalem according to Christ. That first-century generation of Jewish religious leadership would completely "fill up the measure of their fathers" with their persecution of Christians. A "filled up" measure of Jewish leadership persecuting the first-century saints and killing them was the cup which the drunken harlot in Revelation 17 was holding aloft. A "filled up" measure has no more that can be poured into it. The Papacy has had sins of its own commission in much later generations than this Revelation 17 Mystery Babylon was dealing with. They are not related.
When God hands you a detailed description in Ezekiel 12:21-28 of what He means by an "at hand" prophecy, it is best to take heed. God does NOT confuse an "at hand" imminence with times that are far off in the future. The two concepts are polar opposites. You have missed the entire message of the Zephaniah imminent prophecies of approaching judgment and the other prophecies that would take place much later after the Israelite's post-exilic return from their lengthy Babylonian captivity. The "numerous premillennialists" you mention are mistaken in this belief of imminence being the same as something far off.
The ten kings of Revelation 17 never get any crowns at all. They only receive power "AS kings" simultaneously for that brief "hour" it takes to destroy the harlot - not that they ever really were kings. I never said the ten horns in Revelation 17 were the seven heads / kings of the earth. The ten horns were the 10 generals chosen in Jerusalem at the start of the Zealot rebellion in AD 66. Josephus lists all 10 in Wars 2.20.4, and tells which district they were assigned to govern in order to prepare each of those areas for the war with the soon-coming Roman troops.
The seven heads as "kings of the earth" were the 7 members of the high priesthood family of Annas who served almost continuously from AD 6 until AD 66. Annas and his five sons and son in law Caiaphas all were assigned by Rome to the high priesthood during those years. These 7 were followed by an eighth "king of the earth" - Annas's grandson Mattathias - who as the high priest serving in AD 66 also became the titular head of the Scarlet Beast as the independent kingdom of Israel which had re-emerged to existence once more in AD 66 under the Zealot rebellion.
I'm not sure where you are getting this idea, since this is not something I ever wrote.
Of course, Christ the stone does strike the feet and toes in Daniel 2:34. But the ENTIRE STATUE was destroyed together at the same time by that one blow to the feet and toes, with all the elements being crushed into dust together and blown away on the winds. This was not just the government structure of those individual empires being spoken about, since we know that those empires fell in ancient times at different times, one after another, from Babylon on down. Instead, this was Satan's entire realm of demonic forces being destroyed at one time who had been working behind the scenes of each of those ancient kingdoms, trying to interfere with God's plans for the nations. Satan and all his devils and unclean spirits were all destroyed by the single blow of Christ the stone back in AD 70. There are none of them in existence any longer in this world since then.
It is certainly not "blasphemous" to quote Christ when He refers to the high priests of the land of Israel as "the kings of the earth" in Matthew 17:25. The high priests and their sons were "free" from paying the yearly Temple Tax. That was Christ's point to Peter. High priests wore a golden crown with their high priest vestments. For Christ to become "King of kings" meant that His high priesthood after the order of Melchizedek was superior to any Levitical high priest who had ever served before. And the Psalms 2 "kings of the earth" who stood up and took counsel together to conspire against the Lord and His anointed were the corrupt high priests of Israel - Annas and Caiphas along with their kindred.
No, Daniel's growth of Christ's stone kingdom is not an instantaneous one. Just like leaven and the mustard seed, that growth of the stone kingdom has been taking time over the past millennia for that "filling the whole earth" to show after Christ struck the feet and destroyed the entire statue back in AD 70.
Christ was going to "Rule thou in the midst of thine enemies", as God decreed for Him to do. That means enemies of Christ can exist even though Christ rules. God is long-suffering with these enemies, giving them the opportunity for repentance. This is evidence of His grace - not of His lack of kingdom power to deal with them. The New Jerusalem in Revelation 22 that we currently reside in still has dogs, sorcerers, whoremongers, murderers, idolaters and liars just outside the open gates of the city (Rev. 22:15).
The whole concept of the "false Messiahs" which Christ said were coming was tied to that first-century generation. Daniel's Messiah was to show up at the AD 30 year for the beginning of His public ministry when the 70th week began. When Israel rejected Jesus as being the fulfillment of Daniel's 70th week Messiah's coming, they went looking for false Messiah substitutes as close to that AD 30 year as possible, to make the substitution believable for the Jews who were looking for the Messiah back then to deliver them from Rome's government over the nation.
As to the wounded head, Chapter 13 states that one head is “wounded to death.” Dismissing that the phrase “was, and is not” exemplifies the wounding of the head is only one of the failures of the preterist’s view. Furthermore, its revival elicits the same reaction of “wonder” to the world (13:3 and 17:8). Both have seven heads and ten horns.
Moreover, we know the sea beast receives the wound in Chapter 13.
And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth… and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. (Revelation 13:11, 12)
No doubt the sea beast has a “was, and is not” episode in the eyes of the world, supporting historicism and history that Protestantism took the papacy’s power away by secularizing society, which enriched the merchants of the earth.
And mountains are symbolic of kingdoms in scripture (Psalms 2:6; 48:1; Isaiah 66:20; Jeremiah 51:25; and Joel 3:17). It’s puerile to describe a fire on a hill as a deadly wound, or that a literal hill “was, and is not.”
As to the issue of Revelation 17, the focus is on the woman in the wilderness,
So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast… (Revelation 17:3)
The preterist’s dismissal of the connections in Revelation and the OT discredits their rendering of prophecy. The woman is in the wilderness because that is where she is left in Chapter 12. The OT affirms Christ came to punish the shepherds and scatter the sheep, and the remnant finds grace in the “wilderness” (Zechariah 13:7, 10:7-9; Jeremiah 31:1-2, 27-28; Isaiah 49:5-7; Hosea 2:14-23 and Matthew 13:24-30). This evidence points to the woman being God’s people, albeit in a fallen state, but certainly not the first-century Judeans. The harlot of 17 must also enrich the merchants, which is not attributable to said Judeans.
For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies. (Revelation 18:3).
First-century Judeans could not be regarded as enriching the earth’s merchants; the first-century merchants were enriched by Rome, not Judea. And feudalism destroyed the status of the merchants when Rome fell. The most extraordinary rise of the merchants is a contemporary phenomenon commencing with the late eighteenth century that continues to this day. And numerous contemporary historians reveal that the Protestants facilitated that rise, of which you’re obviously oblivious also.
Historically, the Protestants facilitated secularism that enriched the merchants in modern times, along with their wars, which shed the blood of the saints. Revelation 18:24 is the only text that includes “prophets,” without the definite article, which renders it one who receives the gift in this age, not “the prophets” in the OT.
As to imminence, my challenge was for you to provide the passage in Zephaniah that affirms the restoration “would take place much later,” as you put it. You didn’t provide it because it doesn’t exist. So, his people that first read it would have believed the restoration would imminently follow, even though it wouldn’t. The true Israel would have rebuked anything to the contrary, to promote vigilance and quell apathy, the tare that says, “My lord delayeth his coming" (Matthew 24:48). I don’t see how you’ve surmounted my response, except with the usual circuity. The first-century Apostles held the same imminence in their writings.
As to the ten kings, what do you think the crowns represent besides power as kings simultaneously? Your attempt to weave “the kings of the earth” in the Psalm with the ten kings on the beast in Revelation and Acts 4 through the incident of the temple tax is torn down by Daniel 2:34. You fail to understand the transition from the iron legs to the feet and toes represent the end of the reign of the fourth beast and the beginning of the authority of the kings illustrated by the toes and horns. Daniel sees the stone striking the time depicted by the feet and toes and not the iron legs; that is our time, not John’s. Christ did not return in AD 70.
Satan was dealt a devastating blow in the first century, but Rome carried on in its evil ways, even when they legitimized the Church. And the papacy began to make kings bow to it and pagan images as if it were God, fulfilling the little horn/sea beast.
As to Matthew 17:25, that’s a false equivalence. Anecdotal similarity does not command correspondence. The law supporting the temple did not make the high priests kings! You’re making that up. As stated, no priests/kings were allowed by law in Israel. That is the beast’s MO. It was the papacy’s MO. It’s blasphemy.
As to the prophecy where the Father declares to Christ, “Rule thou in the midst of thine enemies,” according to the Revelation and other texts, this rule is commensurate with the overcomes, and the enemies are the survivors of the nations at Christ’s return (Isaiah 24;1-6; Revelation 2:25-27, 3:21, 11:15; and Matthew 25:31-32).
As to Revelation 22:15, Christ fills the kingdom from the time of AD 70, but outside our door, there are “dogs, sorcerers, whoremongers, murderers, idolaters and liars,” huh. That’s called retreating, not ruling. The scripture affirms the overcomer's rule over the nations with Christ at his return, and there is more textual support to relate. As such, in Revelation 22:15, “without the gates” must be interpreted as the extent of Christ jurisdiction at his return. That is why Satan must search the earth's extremities to gather Gog and Magog after a thousand years. The extent of the gates of the city is connected to the expansion of New Jerusalem, which truly provides temporal security from the “dogs, sorcerers, whoremongers, murderers, idolaters and liars,” which is certainly NOT the case in the age we live. We must overcome this age to inherit such security in the age to come.
